BREXIT [Poll] vote!

[EmanueleBGN]

I hope that UK leave EU and that other Countries will follow its choise to destroy the EU dictatorship

 

[Xiphiidae]

How does being in the EU trouble the sovereignty of the UK? Also even if it did would it be a bad thing?

Because EU law effectively takes precedence over UK legislature, which began with the European Communities Act and has continually been reinforced since then, especially by the European Court of Justice in recent years. Thankfully the migrant crisis and talk of a European army has put the importance of sovereignty into perspective, not for only the UK but other nations in Europe as well.

And as for your second question, it's because (believe it or not) Democracy is important, and being able to exercise it without exterior influence from bureaucrats and other nations is a good thing. The way things are headed, more and more power will be taken from the people of the UK. Economic trade agreements are one thing, but to not see the growing authoritarianism of the EU would be naïve, at least in my view.

I hope that Brexit does occur, and that it will produce a domino effect for other nations negatively affected by the EU (Greece and Sweden for example) that already have some anti-EU sentiment to get out as well.

Edit: Fixed some grammar and typos.

 

[FAST6191]

The UK, and every other country in the EU, does not sit there complying with surprise mandates from on high and paying for the privilege -- they send people, elected no less and done so at the same frequency as national elections happen these days, to discuss and debate said things along with the rest of Europe (give or take some fuzziness with some countries like Norway). Functionally I am not seeing a great difference to states in the US, provinces in Canada, states and territories in Australia, German states, French regions and departments, the various countries in the UK and so on and so on. Granted each of those is not without their own issues in the places they form parts of but I would place the notion of a one of those leaving as similar to any of those others leaving.

Also there is a international army composed largely of EU types, it is called NATO.

 

[Xiphiidae]

The UK, and every other country in the EU, does not sit there complying with surprise mandates from on high and paying for the privilege -- they send people, elected no less and done so at the same frequency as national elections happen these days, to discuss and debate said things along with the rest of Europe (give or take some fuzziness with some countries like Norway).

And Brits take up less than 10% of the EU parliament. And let's not forget about the European Council or the European Commission, the members of the latter of which are appointed by the Council and approved by the Parliament. So there's clearly very little in regards to direct representation of the interests of British people, especially when you consider than over half (depending on who you ask) of British laws from the past two decades have been EU regulations or directives. And that's not even going into the thousands of civil servants that play their roles in EU administration.

Functionally I am not seeing a great difference to states in the US, provinces in Canada, states and territories in Australia, German states, French regions and departments, the various countries in the UK and so on and so on. Granted each of those is not without their own issues in the places they form parts of but I would place the notion of a one of those leaving as similar to any of those others leaving.

Firstly, you're wrong about France, as it doesn't have separate governments for its various regions. And secondly, states (as in those of the US of Australia) don't have their own independent economies as such, they often have shared histories going back a hundred years or more, and 'well the US is no different' isn't exactly what I would call a strong argument. The EU (in one form or another) has existed only for a few decades, why would you want your nation diminished to the level of a state/regional government?

Also there is a international army composed largely of EU types, it is called NATO.

NATO is an alliance involving the militaries of a number of nations, not the independent army of a supra-national system.

 

[T-hug]

I'm voting out.

 

[FAST6191]

I am not seeing the problem with the first one -- smaller and smaller divisions will almost always represent smaller parts of the whole. Indeed not doing so is usually considered a bad thing unless you can point to a working meritocracy, and as dearly as I would love to see one of those I imagine I will see a pure communist setup work before then.

I would argue otherwise on independent economies and histories, not to mention the EU itself might be relatively new but the concepts underpinning it go deeper. It has gone wrong in fairly spectacular fashion a couple of times but the concepts were there. The lead up to world war 1 and the groups involved would be where I look for the older ones there. Equally if many of the examples, several of which are newer nations as these things go, don't have independent economies now then I would wonder how much of that is due to modern communications and transport, as well as how much actually still is a somewhat local affair (I know you usually get places in a larger country that get referred to as a breadbasket but I would still look there).
On percentage of laws then quite possibly, how many of those have been terribly opposed or otherwise saw notable opposition we could consider in this? It causes some problems for police where much of their ongoing training would appear to be in EU driven stuff but that would probably be an implementation within the forces thing rather than something more. Otherwise I dare say the US federal government enjoys a greater amount of opposition. Similarly though I have no great problem with the higher courts of the UK I would place more stock in the EU courts for many things, and I definitely trust them to maintain a working IP system more than I trust the UK government to do it. The matter of civil servants creating policy then I would find that preferably to the US style vote every position approach.

Why wouldn't I want the world to get smaller?

Generally I would find national pride to be a good concept in matters of sports, which I can happily ignore for most things, but not much more than that. I dare say that influences more of where I find myself and that might be a fundamentally different one to the position you hold. I said earlier that the "one nation that is Europe" concept the EU seems to push is pretty laughable in their implementation. However I would sooner consider what negatives the UK leaving Europe might have on Europe as a whole than what, seemingly minor, perks there might be for the UK. If it was the route to the land of milk and honey I would possibly still have pause.

France might have been a suspect choice/exercise in list padding, though there would appear to be enough regional identities in parts to have certain takes on separatist movements so I will say there is scope to say something there.

On NATO then as long as my TV says "NATO forces engaged or were engaged, were deployed to ?, were sent to resolve a conflict....." I am not going to be able to be able to make much of a distinction. If the theoretical EU army stood much of a chance of being an aggressor force I would go have a think but I am not seeing it.

 

[Xiphiidae]

~snip~

Well, I suppose we just have different views on the role that a nation should have. I believe that each people (whether it be the British people, or the Australian people, or whoever) should stand up for their own interests and pursue more direct democracy and self-governance. I do not like the idea of making/forcing the British people (or the people of any nation) to make personal sacrifices on the behalf of the rest of Europe or those beyond.

And lastly, I believe 'NATO forces' is just a shorthand for 'the forces of [some number of] NATO members'.

 

[Youkai]

Some people would prefer the old times where every little town was their own "nation" and had their kind which they would follow into war with their neighbours instead of standing together with as much of the whole world as possible.

and Xip you know, we Germans in this thread are not actually saying the UK should not leave because this would benefit us ... actually with UK leaving a lot of the Financial stuff that the EU currently does in London (I read ~700.000 people working for financial companies there and a big lot of them because of the EU) would mainly go to Frankfurt (probably) which would benefit us a lot ... and even if some companies would have a harder time trading with the UK we would still have a big Europe to trade with and the UK would be all alone which would hurt any company that does import and export !

in TV they even said it could help us because the change in the Euro price could be a good thing for us

not sure about the big thing all together but for us small people it would be good if they leave still most people think in the long term it would be bad for all of Europe

 

[Xiphiidae]

Some people would prefer the old times where every little town was their own "nation" and had their kind which they would follow into war with their neighbours instead of standing together with as much of the whole world as possible.

It is possible to stand together with others and still be sovereign. The situation you're describing is merely relinquishing one's freedom. Why is it so bad for people to want to decide how they would want to live their own lives?

and Xip you know, we Germans in this thread are not actually saying the UK should not leave because this would benefit us

Yes, and I'm sure Germany said the same thing to Greece.

and even if some companies would have a harder time trading with the UK we would still have a big Europe to trade with and the UK would be all alone which would hurt any company that does import and export

So no EU countries trade with Iceland, Norway, Switzerland or Lichtenstein? Do EU countries not do trade with China, the US or Australia? Last time I checked we weren't part of the EU.

The UK could still be part of the European Economic Area without being part of the EU. The notion that Brexit would mean that the UK wouldn't be able to trade (or even have a significantly harder time trading) with EU countries any more is a big joke.

 

[FAST6191]

I suppose you then have to ask what is a nation or people, and when does it become one, and when do two or more nations merge. Is it language, is it ease of governance (anybody can reasonably be anywhere in the world in 24 hours for not an awful lot of money, bulk transport is similarly cheap and communications are bordering on free and instant for nearly everybody), is it some take on ethnicity, is it poor governance (how many separatist movements spring from places where people are allowed to get on with their customs and traditions?), what historical factors would want to be considered and indeed how many of those would want to be actively ignored because they are not terribly useful?
Many countries would show a divide in spending vs revenue (in England it is North - South, give or take some things Cornwall does with the north getting more than it gives) and it then risks going into ever smaller lines (various towns in the UK have made bids to be self governing zones distinct from the counties they find themselves in, money, healthcare, local laws and more being cited as reasons for attempting it). That you would consider the Australian people a distinct concept would be a good thing to explore there; most would say it is the case and the only times anybody in the UK really hears about it or considers it would be if rugby is on (nobody cares about cricket that did not go to public school (others reading UK public school more or less means private school elsewhere) or is over 60), they or a friend is going on holiday/doing a working holiday/was once a £10 pom, are currently watching a film/tv show set there or... actually I am not sure much is imported from Australia either (New Zealand lamb is about as close as that gets, though numbers wise there might be something to be said for Australian beef).
What might those personal sacrifices be as well? What tangible effects might there be and would they be outweighed by the less tangible (no visa travel and the ability to work or find someone with skills to come work for me or ship me something without issue is pretty sweet, even if I personally/directly don't make use of a lot of it).

If we do go with the idea that the EU is a new concept then would not some of this be the teething problems of a new nation? There are other regions with similar areas (inhabited ones even), geographic closeness, population, general takes on industry, climates... that get called nations.

Edit
" The UK could still be part of the European Economic Area without being part of the EU. The notion that Brexit would mean that the UK wouldn't be able to trade (or even have a significantly harder time trading) with EU countries any more is a big joke. "
True, however how long would the negotiations take, what concessions would have to be given, is there a viable plan in place and more do also want to be considered. This would be one of the times I go selfish and care about the immediate future than some more abstract more distant future (I am not getting younger and things are starting to pick up for me, if I theoretically have a harder or more complex time for the next few years as things get ironed out then I am going to be one foot in the grave at that point and certainly past my prime, to say nothing of my generally caring for the EU region a bit more than I do the UK -- the UK is probably fat enough to take it).

 

[emigre]

And the pound hits the lowest level since 1985. The economic impact is going to be interesting.

So who reckons the new PM will be? Cameron is a dead man walking now.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

And Britain votes for Brexit!

The pound hits the lowest level since 1985. The economic impact is going to be interesting.

So who reckons the new PM will be? Cameron is a dead man walking now.

 

[VinsCool]

I hope you Britain people won't suffer too much from it.

 

[Xiphiidae]

Freedom has prevailed.

 

[proflayton123]

The pound has dropped.. Very badly


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[emigre]

The pound has literally become toy money now. I think it looks likely stuff like clothes and food will increase. After the last couple of years, I really didn't want another hit to my finances.

Time to start the London Independence movement.

 

[Deleted User]

Wowowowowowo the pound has dropped bad. Good luck people living in the UK...

Sent from my potato I bought with my 0.7432 pound

 

[TotalInsanity4]

Welp, Great Britain just fucked themselves

 

[Deleted User]

Better get your wallets ready because you US people get a 20% discount on the pound. Your nationalism fucked you guys up hard.

GG Britain

 

[emigre]

Don't blame me lads, I voted remain.

Lulz at Brexiters wanting Cameron to stay on, Cam would have no authority. I gonna give D-Cam three months max.

 

[Deleted User]